Guide to WDW Pages 24 & 25

We are now in the downstretch of looking through the Walt Disney World guide from 1979. Two more resorts are on pages 24 and 25. The first is a resort geared towards sports and relaxation--Golf Resort Hotel. Two courses are available for guests to play, the Palm and the Magnolia.

The following page has you staying out in the wilderness with deer, opossums, armadillos, and other creatures at the Fort Wilderness Resort. This place is ideal for kids to run around and explore the outdoors. There is River Country, canoeing, campfires, and the Wilderness Line steam train. The activities continue at night with the Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue and Disney movies outside around the campfire while roasting marshmallows. Yum! I must admit, this place is still my favorite resort, even without the railroad.

Guide to WDW 1979 Pages 22 & 23

What other activities are there to do around Walt Disney World in 1979 you ask? Well, the Walt Disney World guide answers that question on the remaining pages of the guide. Starting with pages 22 and 23, you can find the two resort staples that are still around three decades later with the Contemporary Resort Hotel and Polynesian Village Resort Hotel, respectively. Both have short descriptions for guests to get an idea of the atmosphere of each resort including the activities available for them to enjoy.

Both pages features pictures of the actual resort. It is interesting to look at and compare the impact that plants have on the visual aesthetics of these two resorts in just 30 short years. Although the buildings might look the same, the greenery is much different.

In addition to the customary resort pictures are those of the various activities that can be found at the resorts. The one that sticks out to me is the picture of the Luau girl doing her hula dance. A picture like that makes me want to go put on a lei, eat some Polynesian feast, and enjoy the nighttime fire-lit entertainment. Enjoy.

Guide to WDW 1979 Pages 16 & 17

Pages 16 and 17 of the Walt Disney World guide from 1979 feature yet another map, one that is just as cool as the one on the previous pages. But, instead of a map of the Magic Kingdom, this is a full spread map of the entire Walt Disney World resort as it looked in 1979. This very colorful map is wonderfully drawn and properly labeled. It is great seeing forgotten resorts such as River Country, Discovery Island, and WDW Village prominent on the map. Enjoy.

Guide to Walt Disney World 1979

I love getting brochures, pamphlets, and guide maps when I go to Walt Disney World. The ones we get today in the parks are nice and colorful, but, the ones from the late 1970s and early 1980s were special. This particular one I got from a vacation back in 1979. Now, I said these were special, and being 28 pages, plus the front and back covers, both inside and out, I think qualifies this as special.

The cover tells you what is to come inside this guide, starting with the title of "Your complete guide to the Walt Disney World Vacation Kingdom". There is a nice, offset picture of Cinderella Castle at an angle making it look even larger and more regal with some pink and yellow flowers in the foreground. And, seeing that this guide is "Compliments of Polaroid", it immediately makes you believe there will be a lot of color and picutres inside.

And, of course, you are not disappointed. The brochure, which would more aptly be called a small magazine, is loaded with colorful pictures from all over the resorts and Magic Kingdom. There really is no comparison with today's guides.

Now, besides the pictures, what I really enjoy about this guide, are the little sketches on the left of each attraction description. They just add that little Disney touch to the guide. During this time, the A-E ticket books were being used. So, on the right of each attraction is a color coded letter denoting which ticket is required to experience that particular attraction.

So, I hope you look forward to walking through this Walt Disney World guide with me the next couple weeks to see how the World existed in 1979.

Sony Rear Vision Sweepstakes Fort Wilderness 1989 Brochure

We are getting close to the end of the contents of the Fort Wilderness welcome packet. This ninth item is a 1989 brochure for the Sony Rear Vision Sweepstakes to "Win a Walt Disney World Resort family vacation, including a 5-day/4-night stay at Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground". There are some nice pictures inside of some activities around the resort including carriage rides at the Settlement, horseback riding, and the petting farm. Also, there is a nice picture of some some tubing at River Country, complete with the logo on the tube.

Fort Wilderness Fleetwood Booklet 1988

The eighth item in the Fort Wilderness welcome packet is an October 1988 (10/88) edition of an advertising booklet for Fleetwood. This booklet has 24 pages, but, only the first four pages are of interest to Walt Disney World. The first page, which is the cover, has a nice photograph of Chip N' Dale posing with the campground entrance sign for Fort Wilderness. The second and third pages are a spread for the Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue with a few nice pictures. The fourth page has a picture of the Fort Wilderness Fleetwood Trailer Home Rental as well as a floor plan for the six sleeper model. The other pages of the booklet, which I did not take pictures of, are pictures of various Fleetwood trailer models.

Pirates Point Excursion 1989

If you haven't noticed yet, except for a couple of pieces, all the inserts in the Fort Wilderness welcome packet have been on brown recycled paper. Dated 1989, this sixth item is no exception. What is interesting about this single-sided brochure is it isn't for anything at Fort Wilderness or a park. Instead, it is for an activity at another resort--Disney's Polynesian Resort to be precise. Before the Pirates and Pricesses Parade, Captain Jack Sparrow, and The Pirates League, there was the Pirates Point Excursion. Here, you can sail the Seven Seas Lagoon, hunt for buried treasure, enjoy refreshments...even have a marshmallow roast and sing-a-long with your Pirate Hosts! Yo-ho, yo-ho, a Pirate's life for me! Geez, wish I had done that as a kid.

Fort Wilderness and Fleetwood Brochure 1989

We are now half way through the Fort Wilderness welcome packet. This fifth item is by far the most colorful insert thus far. It is a brochure of Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground fro 1989.

The back is a nice advertisement for The Official Recreational Vehicles of Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort, Fleetwood, and includes a handful of pictures of families roughing it Disney-style at Fort Wilderness.


As you open the brochure, you see a generalized map of Fort Wilderness and its proximity to River Country, Discovery Island, and the Magic Kingdom.


The inside is a layout informing guests to Discover the Fun of Camping and that there is Entertainment All Day Long. Included are several pictures of activities at Fort Wilderness, River Country, Discovery Island, the Magic Kingdom, and Epcot Center. Noticeably missing from this guide is the Disney-MGM Studios which suggests this pamplet came out earlier in 1989.

Disney's Fort Wilderness Guest Questionnaire 1988

With the fourth item in the Fort Wilderness welcome packet, we again finally have an item that is not related to Discovery Island. Instead, we have a Fort Wilderness questionnaire for guests to fill out upon completion of their stay at this frontier inspired resort. The outside back of the questionnaire has a note from then Executive Vice President of the Walt Disney Resorts, Robert I. Small, which reads:

Welcome...

It is a pleasure to have you as a guest at our
resort. My staff and I want your visit to be a dream
come true. All of us believe that Disney Resort
Experiences Are Magic and we are here to ensure
that all your expectations are met. To help keep
the DREAM and the Magic, we need your
thoughts.
It is important to us that you continue to
select the WALT DISNEY WORLD Resort as your
vacation destination. The comments of concerned
guests, like you, help us maintain the standards of
quality that are synonymous with the Disney name.

Thank you for helping us keep the Magic.

Robert I. Small
Executive Vice President
WALT DISNEY WORLD Resorts

The fairly exhaustive questionnaire, which appears on the inside and covers all three pages, reflects Mr. Small's honest invitation to you, the guest, to provide both positive and negative feedback. Your positive responses will help to continue to exceed the guest's expectations of a Disney resort. Likewise, your negative responses, or suggested improvements, will help facilitate in improving any deficiencies in the current guest experience. And, to show Disney truly does value and desire its guests' feedback, the postage is prepaid and addressed directly to Mr. Small.

This type of questionnaire is definitely refreshing compared to the ubiquitous please praise us type of card seen in most establishments today. Typically, five simple items are listed, such as cleanliness, quality of food, friendliness of employees, followed by a couple of lines for comments. Then, to prevent any negative comments from filtering to top management, there is a comment card drop box, where the local manager conveniently has access to dispose of any cards not meeting his/her approval. And to further discourage and feedback, if you want to mail it in, you get to pay for postage. So, even with a simple questionnaire, Disney exceeds guest expectations.

Fort Wilderness Welcome Packet 1989

Every vacation I have taken to Walt Disney World with my parents, whether the summer of 1973 to the fall of 2008, we have always camped at Fort Wilderness. I have many fond memories of this much under-appreciated and overlooked resort, but, I'll save those stories for future posts. What I want to show here is a Fort Wilderness piece from my Disneyphemera collection. This is a welcome packet from 1989. However, it should be noted that the folder itself is dated 1988. The folder is 6" x 10" which is actually a smaller version than one I also have from a vacations a couple years earlier. This packet came with 10 brochures showcasing the various activities in and around Fort Wilderness. The dates on the brochures are from 1988 and 1989, which means this packet was obviously given to guests in 1989. I'll be posting each one of these individual items over the next couple of weeks.


Now, what I love the most about this packet is the detail in the artwork on the cover. This was back when each resort had its own customized welcome packet as opposed to the generic blue one we've become accustomed the last few years. The artwork appears to be a simple pencil sketch, but very detailed. This single cover tells new guests everything available at this one resort. The background is of the Settlement Trading Post including Pioneer Hall. In the foreground, you see a cowboy mounted on a horse. This image is simple and immediately informs guests that horseback riding can be on the agenda at this resort. Various water activities are displayed including fishing, swimming/tubing, and canoing. Another activity shown is the Petting Farm. And lastly, the night time activities including performers from the Hoop-De-Doo Musical Revue and roasting marshmellows and singing around a campfire. Before you even had a chance to open up this packet, your heart was already racing and your mind jumping back and forth on which activity to do first. And, this is just the place you are staying!


On the back of the folder is a map of the entire resort including the bus routes. Back in 1988 & 1989, there were only two bus routes--the Silver Flag Route and the Brown Flag Route. Now, I will admit, the routes on this map are a little hard to follow, as you can see. The map itself doesn't have the actual route, but instead, a little side box has the routes. But, it is just the routes...no map. So, you have to use your imagination and overlay the routes onto the actual map.

Disney has definitely lost some of the magic when it comes to the theming of the welcome packets. Here's hoping, or more aptly, wishing, that we'll see these customized packets return in some form in the coming years.